Tag Archive for 'linux'

VMWare Fusion 2 Beta 2

Published
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Daz
on July 31, 2008
in mac and snippets
. 0 Comments

It’s got friggin’ Unity for Linux!!! This looks good…

The VMWare team has just released the second beta for VMWare Fusion 2.0, the company’s popular virtualization program for the Mac.

The new beta adds a TON of new features, as the video above demonstrates. I got a chance to talk to VMWare today about the new beta and it is HOT. I’ll be posting a more in-depth overview tomorrow, but until then, here are some of the highlights:

  • Unity 2.0 - The newest version of Fusion is really focused on better Windows-Mac integration. You can now launch Windows programs from the dock or access Mac programs from within your virtual machine. You can also link folders like Documents, Pictures and Music on your virtual machine with those folders on your Mac.
  • Multiple Snapshots VMWare has worked really hard to bring a Time Machine-like ease to backing up and protecting your virtual machine. You can now designate how often you want to take full system snapshots of your VM, whether once an hour, once a day or once a week, and how many copies you want to keep.
  • Better Video and Graphics Graphics and shading support has been improved for Macs that have higher-end graphics cards, and even integrated Macs can now play 1080p HD video in virtual machines with considerably less CPU overhead.
  • Support for more client OSs, including Leopard Server You can now run Leopard Server as a VM in OS X 10.4 and 10.5, even on client machines (virtualizing Mac OS X client is blocked by Apple’s license terms). Support for the latest version of Ubuntu (Hardy Heron) is also available right out of the box with Unity integration. Power users can now designate up to four virtual CPUs per virtual machine, which is great for anyone wanting to take an XServe or Mac Pro to the next level.

VMWare Fusion 2.0 beta 2 is available for Intel Macs running OS X 10.4 or OS X 10.5. New users can try the beta for free and the upgrade path (including future betas and the full version of Fusion 2.0) is free for all existing Fusion 1.0 customers.

via TUAW

Install PostgreSQL on Ubuntu 8.04

Published
by
Daz
on May 13, 2008
in linux, noteworthy and postgresql
. 17 Comments

Following up from my old guide to installing PostgreSQL (for Ubuntu 7.10), I thought i’d better do an update for the latest releases… :)

This quick walk-through are my notes for installing the PostgreSQL database server and the PgAdmin administration application on Ubuntu Linux, and also set up the server so it allows access to other PC’s on your network.

Before we move on, this guide was tested on the current release of Ubuntu Linux, (8.04 - Hardy Heron) and PostgreSQL 8.3, but it should also be applicable to older versions (of Ubuntu and PostgreSQL) and other Debian based distros.

Continue reading ‘Install PostgreSQL on Ubuntu 8.04’

Installing R/BioConductor on Ubuntu 8.04

Published
by
Daz
on May 7, 2008
in linux
. 1 Comment

The new version of Ubuntu is out, (as if you haven’t heard that by now), so that means a fresh install to play about with and working just the way I want! :D

One of the tools that I currently need (for the thesis work) is R and the BioConductor libraries. So here’s a quick run down on getting them up and installed on Hardy…

First up, run these commands in a terminal:

sudo apt-get install build-essential g77 gfortran
sudo apt-get install refblas3 refblas3-dev zlib1g-dev
sudo apt-get install r-base

This will then install the R base packages and some of the BioConductor packages, along with the gcc and fortran compilers and some other libraries that will be required for the next step.

sudo -s
R

Now at the R prompt, type the following…

source("http://www.bioconductor.org/biocLite.R")
biocLite()

Now sit back for a few minutes while your system configures BioConductor for you.

Installing VMware Tools on Ubuntu 8.04 (Hardy)

Published
by
Daz
on May 5, 2008
in linux, mac and snippets
. 0 Comments

If you’re a VMware user and want to play around with the latest version of Ubuntu in a VM (like me), you’ll need to get the vmware-tools installed. Unfortunately, things are not quite as straight forward as the previous release of Ubuntu yet, but it was a pretty easy thanks to this great guide.

The latest version of Ubuntu (8.04 a.k.a. Ubuntu Hardy - the world’s most popular Linux distribution) came out yesterday on April 24th. I downloaded it right away to play with on VMware Fusion, my Mac virtualization tool of choice (though I’ve now been told this works in VMware Workstation and VMware Player on the PC too!). It worked pretty well out of the box, with even seamless mouse support working right away, but I needed, of course, to install VMware Tools too, as any good VMware user would do. From there, things turned sour, and I was bombarded with error messages …

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Unix Toolbox

Published
by
Daz
on March 23, 2008
in linux, mac and snippets
. 0 Comments

Found this via a post on Digg. A very useful read if you want to get some more advanced things done in Unix.

This document is a collection of Unix/Linux/BSD commands and tasks which are useful for IT work or for advanced users. This is a practical guide with concise explanations, however the reader is supposed to know what s/he is doing.

full article

Bio-Linux - Bioinformatics Tools for Linux

Published
by
Daz
on March 7, 2008
in linux and noteworthy
. 2 Comments

Bio-Linux is a specialised Linux disro that provides both standard and cutting edge bioinformatics software tools on a Linux base.

I wrote a post on my old blog a little while back now detailing how to use the packages from Bio-Linux in Ubuntu Linux, but it got missed in the migration (sorry to all those who have been searching for it). Here’s a repost and update for Ubuntu 7.10…

Continue reading ‘Bio-Linux - Bioinformatics Tools for Linux’

Stephen Fry on the Eee PC

Published
by
Daz
on February 4, 2008
in linux and snippets
. 0 Comments

I really like the Eee PC - some people at work here have them, and if I could get it past the wife, i’d happily have one! ;)

Seems like the well spoken geek Stephen Fry is quite a fan too:

I am writing this article on a kind of mini John the Baptist, a system that prepares the way of the software saviour whose coming will deliver the 90% of world computer users who suffer under Windows from the expensive, clumsy, costly, ugly, pricey toils of Microsoft.

The Asus EEE PC perched on my knee combines GNU software with a Linux kernel powered by an Intel Celeron Mobile Processor to produce a very extraordinary little laptop. It weighs less than a kilogram, starts up from cold in about 12 seconds and shuts down in five. It has no internal hard disk and no CD drive. It offers 512MB of RAM, 4GB of storage and a seven-inch display; wireless, dial-out modem and ethernet adaptors are available for networking and internet connections, three USB ports, mini-jack sockets for headphones and microphone, a VGA out, an SD card slot and a built-in webcam. All for about £200 - less than the price of a show, dinner and taxi for two in London’s West End.

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Britain Advises Against Vista, Office 2007 for Schools

Published
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Daz
on January 12, 2008
in snippets
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Although I do have to admit to liking MS Office (and indeed MS Office 2007 is good), I have to agree with this recommendation. There is pretty much nothing MS Office could do that OpenOffice could not do for you in a school setting - so why shell out all that money for Office licenses and force the kids parents to as well (or resort to dodgy copies) when free software is good enough. And as for Vista… Linux has my vote for schools every time.

Britain Advises Against Vista, Office 2007 for Schools: “An anonymous reader writes ‘The British government’s educational IT authority has issued a report advising schools in the country not to upgrade their classroom or office systems to Windows Vista or Office 2007. According to this InformationWeek story, the British Educational Communications and Technology Agency says costs for Vista and Office 2007 ‘are significant and the benefits remain unclear.’ Instead, Becta is advising British schools to take a long look at Linux and open source suites like OpenOffice.org.”

via

SSH Shared-Key Setup - SSH Logins Without Passwords

Published
by
Daz
on January 10, 2008
in linux and mac
. 0 Comments

SSH is a great tool for remotely accessing another machine, but entering your password every time you log into a remote box can be a pain if you would like to set-up some background scripts to connect to a server and do something (i.e. a backup script running as a cron job). Here’s how I set-up my Mac to be able to log into my server without the need for a password to be entered each time - the instructions should be good for any variant of Unix/Linux, but you need to take into account path names etc. on your machine.

Continue reading ‘SSH Shared-Key Setup - SSH Logins Without Passwords’

Getting Your DVDs Onto Your Mac/iPod/iPhone

Published
by
Daz
on December 29, 2007
in linux, mac and snippets
. 0 Comments

I’d looked at Handbrake a while back but the GUI was far too confusing for a simpleton like me. It seems like it’s been cleaned up quite a bit now and looks rather useful! (The little video giving an overview of how to work things helps too!)

Handbrake is one of those applications that we adore here at TUAW HQ. It makes converting DVDs into a variety of digital files a snap (though only use it with DVDs you own. Don’t be pirates, kids). Chris Breen, of Macworld fame (and an amateur astronomer it would seem) shows us how to use HandBrake like a pro. Breen goes a step beyond ‘use the presets’ and delves into what many of the options HandBrake offers up actually do, and how they impact your files.

via